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USDA REPORTS ON CATTLE HERD REBUILDING
Jul. 27, 2026
BrownfieldAgNews reports:
The cattle industry continues to look for any signs of herd expansion.
University of Kentucky ag economist Kenny Burdine says the first thing he's looking for is the percentage of heifers on feed, a statistic that's only found in quarterly reports. "I think we'll see what we've been seeing really the last couple of years, kind of the slow and gradual decrease in the number of heifers on feed," he says. "I don't think it's going to paint a crazy picture of widespread retention, but I think it's going to keep kind of nudging us that way."
He tells Brownfield more cattle on feed are expected, but not because there are more feeder cattle available. "What we have done is we've slowed down the pace at which they move through the system," he says. "We've seen decreases in placements. We've seen even bigger decreases in marketing."
The USDA also releases its biannual Cattle Inventory report. "The way that we're not culling this cow right now with the cull rate on track to be something actually between, I think, 7.2, 7.4% if the trend holds," he says. "I'm not going to be surprised at all if we see our first increase in beef count inventory for a while. It'll be steady, I think, to slightly up, and I can be wrong about that. I was wrong in January."
But, he says the data isn't likely to show widespread herd expansion. "I do think the odds are very good that we'll see more beef cows in production," he says. "But I think it'll be a function of simply keeping those cows longer. I don't think we've held back enough heifers at this point to call it, you know, traditional expansion."
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